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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Oliver!,
This review is from: 51/50: The Magical Adventures of a Single Life (Paperback)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
...or, looking for love in all the wrong places.
Kristen in still young, clever, now reliably sober, employed, and living in the LA she loves, but she's lonely and wants a man in her life. She vows to go on 51 dates in the next 50 weeks. Using at the least the power of numbers to her advantage, after all that she should have met at least one man eligible for a rewarding long-term relationship, right? Well, depends. In any case, the premise of the book is to do a chapter per date, and the book works as a sort of diary of her love-life, family life, work life, and general state of mind for that year; the blurb on the back cover suggests a cross between Briget Jones Diary and A Million Little Pieces, but I was thinking more like Groundhog Day. Not every date is really a new date with a new man; sometimes the dates are one of Kristen's uncles, her mom, her healing shaman, her horse, a walk through the observatory; sometimes it's a date, but she has a way when sitting in front of a guy with a cup of coffee, of going into herself and her memory, so instead of a story of what a loser or jerk or prince this new guy is, we often get a good deal of back story on the guy she'd really prefer to be with, usually some beautiful loser who would be poison for her today (and was poison for her when she really did date him). Sometimes the chapter is entirely back story. There is also a lot - A LOT - about her previous abuse of alcohol, nitrous, cocaine, one nighters, herpes, and her new life now that she is sober. She is smart, and can certainly capture a moment in writing, but she's not as tough to pigeon-hole as a personality as she likes to claim she is. Her obsession with her own past story, including her difficulty in forgetting some relationships she'd probably have been better off not having, without question makes it much more difficult to get into a new one. Poor Oliver, so much more thought wasted on him now that's he's history than was spent while he was around! There are many girls who are attracted to one personality type in a man, and once they have him, they somehow expect to have him act in a way diametrically opposed to who they are. They want the bad boy, say, or the dweeb, but then expect him to be a gentleman or a stolid protector, etc. It does not work that way; with guys, what you see is usually pretty much what you get. Kristen is disappointed in so many of the people she meets, she knows full well that they just are not the bad boy creative cycle-boy tattooed sexual superman deep conversationalist she wants; and if they are, then they are thoughtless, rude, and definitely not sober. Well, duh. The book isn't all head-slappingly frustrating. Kristen writes touchingly about her family, her difficult life with (and without) her ne'er-do-well drug-dealing father, her Republican and her gay flower-shop owning uncles, her unconventional and real friendships, etc. This is without question the best part of the book. But as for the dating, one can see where this is going from pretty far away, and, strangely, it's tough to feel that much sympathy.
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
i was prepared to be disappointed in this book...,
By
This review is from: 51/50: The Magical Adventures of a Single Life (Paperback)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
...but 51/50 turned out to be completely engaging. our protagonist, and author kristin mcguiness, opens with something of a personal challenge to herself: with newly found sobriety and a personal history that has precluded dating deep into her twenties, engage in a journey that winds through men, spirit, and the hills around L.A. in search of something special.
51/50 is as much autobiography written in real time, as it must have been a philosophic and spiritual journey. the book itself is as much a character as is her mother, shaman, father, uncles, friends, her horse, and the men who bounce around in her personal pinball machine. ordinarily i personally find this sort of journaling repellent as a form of literature, but this kristen mcguiness compels you to look deeply into each connection she makes and the context she brings to every meeting. who knows if hers is a sympathetic figure. from her own description she is beautiful and, well, purely L.A. she escapes deep addictions to alcohol, coke, and lifestyle and, through determination and, well, genetically imbued spunk, to get her dream job, remain beautiful, and write. who among us has time (inclination?) to go out on 50 dates in a year? she embodies the archetype that the rest of us either admires from afar, or detest for the happy superficiality. some speak of the NY Yankees in the same way, and woody allen has opinions on the differences between NYC and L.A. we all do, and you will bring that bias with you in this celebration of all things L.A. kristin embraces L.A. the way the heroines of Sex and the City embrace NYC, though 51/50 wanders through both. who NEEDS to read this book? the answer might surprise you. men. fathers need to read of the role they play in the lives of their daughters. men need to be reminded of the complexities and legacy of what goes on in the minds of the women they love... or the women they just met. while kristin is on a journey in 51/50, forget about that. this book could turn into 501/500 and be every bit as engaging as we accept the invitation deep into her life of conquest. every date/week/whatever offers up a perfect little cupcake of understanding, any one of which is worth celebrating. but here you will want to take the whole box home. and learn. if you are familiar with Shantaram and gregory david roberts's prose, you will find a familiar writing style here. every one of the fifty chapters builds and resolves neatly and builds for the next, a satisfying read that allows context to mingle with content. i am not sure how this book is being marketed, but i am pretty sure that the target is not 50 year old men (moi). the cover on the pre-release vine program "uncorrected proof" is a condor's-eye view of a really skinny chick supine on a lawn with polaroids of dudes. the emphasis in the title is the word "magical". the tattoo on the ankle is a butterfly (drawn from meaning on date 39). unless their sisters buy it for them, this book will never land in the right hands. ...and i am not sure the sisters will be so enthusiastic about reading it. but the book is worth the effort. buy it if you are single. buy it if you are a guy. buy it if you are a dad (married, or not) for insight into the mind of this one little example of the lovely machinations of one female mind. i reserve 5 stars for the likes of Moby-Dick. this gets 4 stars and a "what is kristin mcguiness going to do next?"
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
West Coast Egomaniac,
This review is from: 51/50: The Magical Adventures of a Single Life (Paperback)
Living on the East Coast, I have always heard the stereotypes of the self-absorbed, narcissistic egomaniacs on the opposite coast. Ms. McGuiness does little to disprove this image. I found her "adventures" annoying and trite.
McGuiness is highly critical of others despite obvious issues of her own. Her writing style is nothing short of mediocre. She tries, but fails, to utilize flashbacks in her story telling. The effect is distracting and takes away from the point she is trying to make at the given time. I found myself not caring whether or not she found "true love." Or if she ever even went on another date. What irked me the most was her portrayal of her first and third date Richard. He seemed like a genuinely nice and interesting man. The type so many women would be very happy with. However, the facts that he did not sample every single flavor of gelato and was not a fan of Indian food were the nails in his coffin. Thank goodness we have Ms. McGuiness to warn us about such unsophisticated, "normie" men! Well, I guess we can't all be recovering alcoholics/drug addicts with Daddy-issues like the author herself!
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